Joe is Professor of Biology at the University of New Mexico where he also serves as Director, Curator of Mammals, and Curator of Genomic Resources at the Museum of Southwestern Biology. Previously, he was Professor of Biology and Chief Curator at the University of Alaska Fairbanks (1990-2001) and then was Chair of the Biology Department at Idaho State University (2000-2003). He is heavily involved in efforts to encourage greater participation of underrepresented students, especially Native Americans, in biology. His research has built large museum collections (traditional and genomic) that are digitally web-accessible. He now chairs the AIM-UP! Research Coordinating Network sponsored by the National Science Foundation, which is exploring new ways to incorporate museum collections and associated big data into education initiatives and curriculum reform. His research focuses on conservation, molecular evolution and systematics of mammals and associated parasites, producing over 125 peer-reviewed publications, including the book, Recent Mammals of Alaska. Over two decades, he led two international, specimen-based field projects aimed at understanding the biogeography of Beringia (Beringian Coevolution Project) and Alexander Archipelago (ISLES). Most recently, he co-founded Collaborative Integrated Investigations of Arctic Biomes to engage local communities, resource managers, and botanists, parasitologists and mammalogists from academia in building site-intensive and spatially-extensive Archival Observatories to explore the relationships between environmental change, natural resource management, and human health at high latitudes. (OCTOBER 2013). KCAW INTERVIEW